Selena Gomez turns producer with ‘Thirteen Reasons Why’

In 2008, Mandy Teefey, the mother of the pop star and actress Selena Gomez, was browsing at a Barnes & Noble when she spotted Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher. The best-selling young adult novel tells the story of Hannah Baker, a high schoolgirl who kills herself, leaving behind cassette tapes detailing the 13 people she blames for driving her to suicide. It’s no surprise that, standing in the bookstore, Teefey was compelled to read it: Woven into Hannah’s dark account of isolation, adolescent betrayal and sexual stigmatising are messages of acceptance and compassion, yet it unfolds like an emotional thriller. Not much later, Teefey and Gomez were eating sushi with Asher, negotiating for the rights.

When the option expired for Thirteen Reasons — the original idea was a movie vehicle for Gomez — the production company Anonymous Content introduced them to the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Brian Yorkey (Next to Normal), who wrote the adaptation. “We were all so nervous,” said Gomez of pitching the project as a 13-part (naturally) television series. “I think Netflix bought it because they could see how passionate we were about it.” The series, which stars the newcomer Katherine Langford, begins on March 31.

Right before production, Gomez, an executive producer on the series alongside her mother, took a 90-day career sabbatical for her health. “It felt like” the show “was mirroring what was going on in my life,” said Gomez, who has lupus and struggles with anxiety and depression. “But my mom would send me really horrible-quality versions of the dailies on my phone saying, ‘This is such a beautiful scene.’”

Gomez is also back on the pop charts with the song It Ain’t Me, with Kygo. Preceding her arrival at the London Hotel in West Hollywood, California, a hotel employee and her security guard were hashing out a route that Gomez, always a tabloid target, could take through the empty lobby and up to a suite where she’d meet Teefey and Yorkey to discuss Thirteen Reasons. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

Selena, you were 15 and a major teen star when you optioned the rights to Thirteen Reasons. How did you and your mother convey your interest to Jay Asher?

SELENA GOMEZ: I think he understood that I knew what it meant to be bullied. I went to the biggest high school in the world, which is the Disney Channel. And my mom had a lot of history dealing with [bullying]. I heard her stories growing up. She’s very open about it.

MANDY TEEFEY: When I was growing up, I was always bullied because I was the outsider, the weird girl with the purple hair and combat boots. Then I was a teen mom. You get really judged. I had counsellors telling me how I’d ruined my life, [Selena’s] life and how I ruined the father’s life, even though he participated.

Selena, once Thirteen Reasons went from being a feature to a series, did you mind taking a behind-the-scenes role?

GOMEZ: The older I got — once I left my series, once I started to go for roles that weren’t that age range — it organically began to become a project that I knew I would be behind the scenes with. I actually like that I’m not in it. To be honest, this book has such a huge following. I wanted it to be credible. If I’m a part of it, that’s going to cause a whole other conversation.

Meaning that you’d be a distraction?

GOMEZ: Yeah. And I knew that.

BRIAN YORKEY: It’s also kind of perfect because you have this huge fan base. That’s what I kept thinking about, Selena will say, “Hey, check out what I’ve been working on because it’s really important to me,” and [her fans] will check it out. This is a show that they need. We all believe it will save lives — because the book has.

Selena, has social media changed since you’ve been in the public eye?

GOMEZ: When I was on Wizards of Waverly Place, we didn’t have social media really. Twitter had just begun. Every Friday, I’d get to do a live taping in front of all these little kids and make their life. That’s when I was the happiest. Then, as I got older, I watched it go from zero to a hundred. So I’m actually glad it took us this long to create this project because it’s so relevant now.

Do you read the comments on your 114 million-strong Instagram feed?

GOMEZ: You can’t avoid it sometimes. I delete the app from my phone at least once a week. [brittle laugh] You fixate on the [negative] ones. They’re not like, ‘You’re ugly.’ It’s like they want to cut to your soul. Imagine all the insecurities that you already feel about yourself and having someone write a paragraph pointing out every little thing — even if it’s just physical.

Is the book better suited to be episodic than told in one film?

TEEFEY: One of the reasons it didn’t work as a feature was that there wasn’t enough time to tell the stories of the other characters and why they were making the decisions they were making. [Brian] was able to make them three-dimensional so that, at some point, you felt badly for them, too. That’s why the feature [script] didn’t work. Hannah just seemed mean.

YORKEY: The book takes place in one night and spends most of the time telling the story of Hannah in the past. So we expanded the present-day story. Part of it was figuring out the best way to be very faithful to the book but at the same time to reinvent it as television.

What conversations did you have about the tone?

YORKEY: We talked a lot about True Detective, Mad Men, about Breaking Bad. Not that Thirteen Reasons is anything like those shows. But they’re very adult shows that tons of kids are watching. [Thirteen Reasons] is not just for kids — it’s for everybody, we hope. First and foremost, it was about taking kids seriously.

TEEFEY: Kids are smarter than you think.

YORKEY: They’re sophisticated television viewers. They’re so savvy about story and conflicting motives and the way things happen in their lives. It’s like, “Let’s try not to condescend.”

Mandy, how early did Selena show that savviness?

TEEFEY: She was 6 or 7. I thought I wanted to be an actor. She went to one of my rehearsals with me and sat through the whole thing, not moving. On the way home, she was quiet, and then she goes, “You know, Mom, that might be funnier if you did it em>this/em> way.” And I thought, Oh, no. She’s going to be an actor. I’m surprised she actually had friends. She used to make the kids in the neighbourhood do casting calls and try to direct them.

GOMEZ: You can hear my voice in the background [on the home movies]. I’m like, “Move to the left.” “Say it again.”

Where in the world did you find Katherine Langford?

YORKEY: She’s from Perth, Australia. We did a global search, and she recorded a tape. A lot of fantastic kids read for us, but nobody was Hannah. Then we saw Katherine. And we thought: Really? Can we cast Hannah off a self-tape from Perth, Australia? So Tom McCarthy [the director] did a Skype work session with her, and when he came out of the session he said, “I think she’s the one.”

TEEFEY: Our actors are insane. I feel like we acquired the casting of Freaks and Geeks. Or My So-Called Life. Like, there’ll be a reunion photo [in the future], and everybody [will be famous].

YORKEY: But should that happen, we would not mind having more seasons than Freaks and Geeks and My So-Called Life [which each lasted one season], with much love to both of those shows, which are huge parts of why we’re here.

Selena, four years ago Spring Breakers allowed you to graduate to more mature roles. Is executive producer another leap?

GOMEZ: I could do any tomboy/teen princess movie in the world if I wanted to. I could do those for years. But I want to be a part of projects that have value, that really matter. And it’s really hard to do that. Sometimes I feel defeated. I’ll audition for a part that I feel very passionate about, meet with people, tell them I’m willing to go places. I think they think I won’t go there. To be honest, I don’t think it’s going to happen anytime soon for me. I think I look really young and image-wise, it’s difficult for people to grasp. But early on, my mom taught me that sometimes you just have to create those projects for yourself. That’s what I want this to be: a launching pad.